


The Long Night

by Killer_Rabbit_of_Caerbannog



Category: DCU, Justice League & Justice League Unlimited (Cartoons), Justice League - All Media Types
Genre: Blow Jobs With Teeth, Choking, Collars, Dubious Consent, Hypothermia, Justice Lords Universe, M/M, Overstimulation, Porn with Feelings, Possessive Behavior
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:33:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24825370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Killer_Rabbit_of_Caerbannog/pseuds/Killer_Rabbit_of_Caerbannog
Summary: He tells himself that Lord Superman loves him, so there's no harm in having a single night together.
Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Lord Batman/Lord Superman (Justice Lords Universe)
Comments: 28
Kudos: 207
Collections: Superbat Reverse Bang 2020





	The Long Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Yamada_CZ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yamada_CZ/gifts).



> Inspired by the amazing [Yamada](https://yamad-a.tumblr.com/) and their [crazy hot Justice Lord's art](https://twitter.com/LordYamada/status/1274615984406573056), seriously go check it out. It was a joy to work with them for the the Superbat Reverse Bang this year and they gave me so many hot kinks to choose from for this art, so I had fun imagining what a not quite evil but hella possessive Superman might be into if he had a chance to sleep with Batman.
> 
> Also a big Thank You to the mods who made this SBRB an absolute delight.

Lord Batman awakens to a heavy shroud of darkness and cold.

There’s a hollow silence to the darkness, at total odds to what he is accustomed to. The rustling of the resident bats, the whirr of machinery, and the steady dripping of water over the cave walls that all echo through the space and chases away the cold emptiness. Here, there is nothing. A yawning, relentless nothing that seems to swallow light and sound and joy, until all that’s left is cold. He knows this place. It’s a smudged idea that is slow to bloom inside his head, but it quickens his heart all the same, sending warmth tingling down his limbs. He _knows_ this place. He is Lord Batman, he is Bruce, and he shouldn’t be here.

Bruce blinks, feeling the frost crumble from his eyelashes. He flinches in alarm and a new panic sets in at the movement – he can’t feel the left side of his body where it’s touching the floor.

Shock is beginning to set in, a dangerous response in his situation. He knows how to handle fear, knows how to dismantle a gun, and take punches from aliens, even knows how to kill humans and gods, but he can’t fight biology. He can’t fight himself. Bruce’s head begins to fog as his heart jackhammers in his chest, pumping the flood of adrenaline through his veins. He grunts and forces his breaths to slow despite the pain each inhale brings, the icy chill of the air tearing at his lungs like razor blades. The fog shrouding his mind recedes, the danger of going into shock subsiding. He _hopes_.

Bruce blinks his eyes open, staring sightlessly into the void before him as he takes stock of the situation.

His teeth hurt. Bruce frowns, wriggling his fingers absently as pins and needles explodes across his skin. Why are his teeth hurting? Had he been punched and knocked out cold? Cold. He couldn’t quite remember anything apart from the ache in his jaw that he feels all the way down to his gums. He should sit up, he thinks, a reasonable enough thought, although he’s not entirely sure why. This place, he shouldn’t be here. There was something he needed to do. He should…

With a groan, he rolls onto his back, shuddering when his body sparks to life, frozen muscles and skin beginning to heat with blood the more he moves. Don’t ever stop. That had been an important rule to survival, one he’d told the little ones when they would fly across the rooftops that first time, whooping with laughter. Don’t stop moving or it’s all over. Cramps rack his body, toes spasming in his boots and gloved fingers curling into claws as sensation returns to them. He’s lucky they can still move at all, not black and dead inside his clothes to be cut away like weeds.

Bruce blinks rapidly, wet eyes stinging from the cold. This is dangerous. He knows it’s dangerous. He can’t quite recall why. The hypothermia is a concern, certainly, but he’s sure there was something else. There was a secret, a broken heart, and a false smile.

He’s sure there’s something else.

The only warning is a tinkling of ice like silver bells before light floods the room and robs his stinging eyes of any chance at sight.

“Awake at last, Bruce? I’m so glad, I was beginning to worry.”

At the sound of that warm, familiar voice, Bruce remembers _fear_.

There’s a new guard at the Watchtower, fresh faced with a sharp jawline and almond eyes.

The guard smiles and tips his head with a quiet reverence whenever Lord Batman deigns to join the rest of the Lords, and despite himself, the sight of the guard’s awe rankles Lord Superman, quickening his feet to escape the cavernous halls. Monitors beep angrily as he slips out the doors without entering his key code. There’s always monitors beeping these days. It used to be a comforting sound, a reminder that he is watching, keeping an eye on the world, and waiting for its shaky inhale before disaster strikes. Now, it’s a reminder of other things, decisions that gnaw at his skin at night until his body crawls with the reminder of his sins.

The monitors bring voices, thousands crying out in anger or fear. He listens to their desperate cries, girding his heart with the terrible sound until any foolish notion of sin quietens and the itch disappears from his flesh. The smile on his lips feel strangely hollow, even though he is so happy and at peace he nearly shakes apart from the joy of it. Lady Wonder Woman glances at him, wary eyes no longer concealed by the curtain of her hair. She’d stopped asking him if he was all right days, weeks, ago. He can’t quite remember anymore, the passage of time blurring as his mind closes on a single thought. Don’t stop moving. Don’t stop, don’t stop, _don’t stop_. Wally had stopped long enough to be caught by _him _and the whole world had witnessed how that had ended. Luthor’s cold smile for the cameras and a single shotgun blast that destroyed everything, reminding him of how wicked humans could be down to their marrow. It reminded him exactly why the world needed the Lords in the first place. He can’t stop now that they had brought global peace. The humans still needed their Lord. His own smile feels wrong, carved onto his face like marble. He doesn't want to smile like that, like their late President, but he feels like he's forgetting how. He feels like he's forgetting a lot of things these days, only the living reminders of who he had been wandering the halls and grounding him with their presence.__

____

There’s a warm chuckle, the soft touch of a gloved hand on the guard’s shoulder. The new guard beams at Lord Batman, gun held loosely in his hands as he nods, lips curling around a playful joke that draws an answering tug in the corner of Lord Batman’s mouth. There’s a heat in his eyes that follows Lord Batman’s retreating back, a desperate longing that he’d seen too often in the eyes of criminals that shiver with want, thinking of how they could be the ones to break the Dark Knight. Lord Batman is untouchable, unbendable, beyond the reach of any mere mortal, and so they long for him. A good man, a better man than the rest who never once wavered from the path and never stopped being so beautifully _good._ He knows those looks, knows no good can come of it, and when he asks J’onn to relocate the soldier with a careless smile, he doesn’t bother to explain. J’onn understands without words.

____

The guard disappears from the Watchtower, and Kal-El can smile easily once again. Still, he takes a moment to slip away to the Fortress and make up a little room, just in case. Lord Batman would never betray him and his trust, but Bruce was kind, Bruce could so easily be led astray. And Kal-El loved him, draped the little room in crimson sheets from the Watchtower and a hook in the bed’s headboard. Just in case. Bruce was always so very kind. Kal-El chooses a room in the centre of the Fortress where the ice is at its thickest and no light or air from the outside world could ever reach it. Just in case.

____

____

____

____

A hand that burns like a furnace strokes his cheeks before carefully peeling back the cowl from his face.

____

“What have you…?” Bruce slurs, confused, his tongue heavy in his mouth. His thoughts keep scattering away like smoke when he tries to focus. The hands feel nice on his skin, chasing away the numbness. His head is tilted back, sending an explosion of pain down his back as his stiff muscles stretch from the cold (has it been minutes? Hours? Days? Not knowing is somehow more frightening than the present moment). Lips brush over his mouth, warm breath melting the frost still clinging to his eyelashes. There’s a searing sting and blood dribbles down his chin, shockingly hot. A hard mouth kisses the bite mark, sucking on Bruce’ split lip.

____

“I was worried about frostbite, but I imagine the suit will have saved you from most of that. You’re always so prepared.”

____

There’s a rattle of chains and Bruce struggles to refocus, the lights still burning his retinas with bursts of red-black flares. He blinks hard, eyes streaming, as something hard clicks closed around his neck.

____

“Don’t…” he mumbles, pressing against a warm chest.

____

Clark laughs, rocking back on his heels. “But you look so much better like this,” he tells Bruce, running a finger around the heavy collar. “Although if you’d rather something else…” He tilts his head to the side, considering. The gesture is achingly familiar.

____

“I suppose I could burn the mark into your skin,” Clark says slowly, but he sounds unhappy with the idea.

____

“Where… are we?” Bruce asks, touching the collar. There must be a reason for it, he’s sure he remembers Clark mentioning collars once, long ago. It must have been something related to Justice Lord business… yes, that was it. “This is the Fortress?”

____

Clark watches him, a soft smile on his face. “Yes, I brought you here yesterday, remember? I’m sorry for leaving you down here like that but there were a few things I had to do before I could come visit.”

____

Bruce nods, clenching and unclenching his hands and feet. They’re slow to respond, a worrying numbness in his toes that doesn’t seem to fade as the minutes pass. “We should get going,” he says to himself, moving to stand.

____

Clark doesn’t move from the ground, tilting his head back to watch as Bruce struggles to straighten his frozen limbs. His body is beginning to shake, heating up enough to remember that he needs to get warm. He frowns at Clark’s motionless form, not moving to follow.

____

Clark’s smile widens. “Where are we going, Bruce?” he asks kindly.

____

That stumps him because his memories don’t seem to reach back that far. He… was patrolling. And he was here now. Clark was here. And the Fortress was always safe for him, so why was he so afraid? There must have been an important mission, one he’s forgotten in the biting cold, his frail human body a weakness to his teammates once again. He grimaces and straightens, refuses to let himself double over from the shivering that now wracks his body, not while Clark was watching.

____

“Do you need…” He frowns, gathering his scattered thoughts and forcing his mouth to shape them into words. “Have you taken care… of everything, then? We don’t need to leave?” That sounds right, that sounds like Lord Batman’s usual unwavering focus on the mission. He needs to remember before he hinders Clark even more, but his brain felt so heavy on his shoulders, the shivers wracking him now in uncontrollable tremors.

____

Clark ducks his head, broad shoulders rising as he bites back laughter. Bruce blinks, noticing for the first time the absence of the uniform. There are no black and white lines of the new suit, nor even the old red and blue cape. Clark is in a dress shirt and tie, glasses perched on his face, the little reporter ID from the Daily Planet clipped in place.

____

_That’s wrong_. Bruce frowns at the stray thought, trying to follow that thread as Clark stands, brushing ice from his slacks. Clark didn’t dress like that anymore. The white cloak was never absent because he never stopped, just like Bruce couldn’t, not even when they finally managed to find that doorway to the other side and those _faces_ -

____

“We really need to get you warmed up,” Clark says kindly, but he’s laughing, and Bruce can’t shake the feeling that it is wrong. Clark didn’t laugh anymore. _He_ never laughed, not like he used to with Wally. All he left was smiles that filled Bruce with a strange unease.

____

Bruce sways, hands reaching blindly for support. Clark steps to his side and wraps Bruce’s bicep in an iron grip. He pulls Bruce from the room like a ragdoll, through winding tunnels of ice, a blur of luminescence. That was familiar to him, at least, sluggish thoughts latching onto the glowing crystalline walls. From the scant few times Bruce had been to the Fortress, he had always wondered at the strange light that threaded its halls. Perhaps the alien glow of the crystal walls had called to that small, alien kernel lurking within Clark’s heart, a comforting, relentless radiance that permeated the place. He’d wondered if Clark ever missed his home world, as unknowable as it was to him, that there was something in his very DNA that sang of Krypton’s dazzling world of crystal spires bathed in the red light of their sun. He wondered if Krypton even had ice.

____

His tongue feels overly thick in his skull, slow to move as he tries to wet his lips. The faint tang of his own blood refocuses his spiralling thoughts from the dangerous lull of the hypothermia. Clark’s hand was a brand of its own, scorching hot skin that Bruce could still feel through the suit. Clark had always run hotter than ordinary humans, skin always warm like the sun itself was radiating from within him. Once, Bruce had loved those hands on him. He frowns as his heart squeezes at the thought. Why did he feel so sad?

____

“And here we go!” Clark stops them before a heavy metal door, solid bars running across its length to anchor it firmly to the walls. Stepping inside brings a wave of heat, far too warm after the chill of the Fortress and his icy body, drawing a pained grunt from Bruce’s throat as the hot air hits him like a physical thing. He stumbles, crumpling, but Clark’s merely tightens his grip as he continues to drag him towards the centre of the room. There’s a bed with crimson sheets. It’s familiar. The heat of the room makes Bruce’s shivering worse, but his mind is clearer. Clark hadn’t worked at the Planet for years. Not since they had gotten so busy, not since Luthor had… But no, he had been working there again, ever since his powers had…

____

There had been the other one, the other Batman who had recoiled at the sight of peace the Lords had given the world. There'd been Wally, alive and well and just as surprising as he'd always been before Luthor had gotten hold of him. And there'd been the old _him_ , the beautifully hopeful Superman who had existed before all this mess. And Bruce had stolen it all from him, stripped Lord Superman away and destroyed Kal-El with Luthor’s weapon until only Clark Kent remained, powerless despite his screaming rage. And Bruce hadn’t been Lord anymore, because there was no more Lords, no more teammates or Watchtowers or control, just him left to continue in a peaceful world still terrified of the same Lords now powerless as the portal to the other world closed behind them.

____

Bruce is shoved onto the bed, pressed into the crimson sheets by muscled thighs that bracket his hips. There’s a rattle of chains and a click as the lock snaps closed through the loop on his collar. Bruce stares up at Clark, smiling behind his old glasses as he tears the suit from Bruce’s body like paper.

____

“Luthor took your powers,” he says, but the words come out soft, uncertain. Afraid.

____

Clark’s smile widens, the hungry, dangerous smile from Bruce’s memories. Lord Superman’s smile when he’d held Bruce down that night, mouth on his cock as he pressed his fingers inside Bruce’s swollen rim, stroking over the patch of nerves that had him screaming for more.

____

“He should have done a better job of it, then,” Clark, no, Kal-El says. “You should have known better, Bruce, to think this was the end of it. Did you think I would sit back and let the world ruin itself, that I wouldn’t get my powers back? Not even death can stop me, _you_ know that.”

____

Bruce glances around the room. There are no windows, just a table and two chairs, a bookshelf filled with dark volumes, and a chest emblazoned with a red ‘S’. A remnant of the old regime. He glares at Clark, clenching his jaw against his chattering teeth.

____

“You can’t keep me here. My boys will notice I’m gone.”

____

Clark, Kal-El, shrugs, waving a hand around the room. “Let them come. It won’t be long before my powers return completely, and it’s been so long since I’ve had a proper workout. Besides,” he places a hand over the collar and catches Bruce’s eyes. Shifting forwards onto his knees, he presses down slowly, doesn’t look away as Bruce tries not to struggle against the crushing weight against his throat. When he gasps, hips bucking, Kal-El laughs, pulling his hand away to press over Bruce’s heaving chest. “By the time any would-be rescuers notice you’re missing, let alone find you… well, I’m sure by then we’ll have come to a better understanding with one another. I have all the time in the world to… ‘re-educate’ you.”

____

Kal-El taps his fingers over Bruce’s heart, a staccato drumbeat as he looks at Bruce with unhinged adoration. “You’ll never betray me again, Bruce. Once you’ve been properly punished, once I break you in then _maybe_ I can forgive you and let you out. Once you’ve learned your lesson. Then we can get back to protecting the world as the Justice Lords. After all, you love me, don’t you, Bruce?”

____

Kal-El kisses him, soft and slow and gentle, exactly the way Bruce had always imagined. The woodenness of _that night_ was nowhere to be found in the slow, hungry way Kal-El explores Bruce’s mouth, each kiss lingering, tongue sliding against his in languorous desire. It’s everything he had wanted, once upon a time. Too-hot fingers slide over his chest, rubbing at the delicate skin above his collarbone before wrapping loosely over the collar at his throat.

____

Bruce shivers, no longer from the cold. Something worse chills his body as those fingers splay out and dig against the edges of the collar, grinding it against his skin.

____

This Lord Superman has the soft smiles of Clark Kent, his sweet kisses mixed with the unrelenting grip of Kal-El. Bruce kisses back, fear licking up his spine as he surreptitiously scans the room for a window, a crack, anything at all that could mean freedom. The walls are perfectly smooth, windowless, and if not for the furniture laid out almost exactly like the old room in the Watchtower, Bruce could almost believe it was a mistake, a desperate grab for the past. Except for the metal bucket demurely tucked into the corner. Tears prick his eyes at the sight of the bucket, the reality of its purpose confirming what he’d suspected. It’s not _his_ room, nor is it the site of an execution chamber. It was a cell. One that expected its occupant to remain in for quite some time. How loving, how thoughtful of Kal-El to provide him with a piss bucket. Bruce wants to vomit at his own stupidity.

____

A thumb presses into Bruce’s chin, forcing his head back until Kal-El’s lips brushed against his chin, a delicate kiss that lingered as he watched Bruce through hooded eyes. Despite himself, Bruce recoils at the sight. This man, this alien god half de-powered and furious, stripped of an empire and a reign of peace, kissed Bruce like he meant it. Like he savoured it. This man might just be right – this time, he was going to _break_ Bruce.

____

____

____

____

“Are you angry?” Lord Superman tilts his head, dark eyes glittering from the city lights far below.

____

In the darkness of the bedroom, the shining god of the new world watches Lord Batman with a plastic smile, hands behind his back. Like a dictator, Bruce thinks before shoving away the stray thought. He’d hoped that at least in Lord Superman’s private quarters he’d be more open, more himself. He’d come to the room hoping to find Clark Kent. To be frank, Bruce isn’t entirely sure Clark Kent exists anymore.

____

“What’s the matter, Lord Batman?” The title feels wrong when the voice curls around it with worry, too kind for the alien who hadn’t hesitated to steal another life today. “If you’re angry, then you can-”

____

Bruce bites his tongue, staving off the urge to swallow. He can’t show weakness while those dark eyes are on him. “No,” he breathes, running his fingers over his cowl. At least he doesn’t have to manufacture the tremor in his hand.

____

“You are angry,” Lord Superman grumbles, sounding so normal, so much like _Clark_ , that for a moment Bruce lets himself forget. “You’re always so much more yourself when you’re angry at me.”

____

“Christ, what does _that_ say about me then?” Bruce drawls, huffing when Clark clicks his tongue at the casual blasphemy. Kansas boy through and through.

____

“It means you are a good man.” Clark steps away from the window, hands stretched out in supplication. “You don’t waver, you don’t pretend, you face things head on and you never give up. You were always the best of us, Batman, and that’s why you never followed through until someone else took that first step. I don’t mind if you’re angry at me for it if it means I helped ease your burden.” And just like that, Clark vanishes and Kal-El smiles guilelessly back into Bruce’s rising fury.

____

“So, you think you did this for my sake? Lobotomising the Joker into a drooling mess is what we do now?” he spits, disgusted, that blank face and vacant smile swimming across his vision. He nearly misses the ripple over Kal-El’s face, his lips flattening into a straight line, mask-like, a painted smile on a doll’s face.

____

“It was necessary.”

____

That old refrain. Kal-El’s eyes flicker as Bruce turns, anger winding through his every limb at those flippant, poisonous words. Dark eyes move lazily from his hands down to his legs, dragging back up over his thighs, his hips, his chest. They rest for a second too long in his throat before Kal-El meets Bruce’s eyes, face still carved into that jack-o-lantern grin. Lord Superman had never looked so alien than in that moment. He flinches before he can stop himself.

____

Kal-El’s whole body jerks forward and Bruce immediately recoils.

____

They both still.

____

Outside, a helicopter cuts through the night sky, sending golden shadows dancing across the walls. Kal-El’s hands are still outstretched, fingers splayed in the air like he was approaching some wild animal. Bruce has only half-turned away, hips tilted just enough to hide his fingers resting on his belt, the casing and single slider the only thing keeping the kryptonite tucked away. Every instinct tells him to move, to assess the enemy for their weaknesses and to _fight_ , but he knows full-well that is a deadly option. He knows that dangerous calm in Kal-El’s eye, had seen it enough in those past few months from across the battlefield, had looked through monitors and saw the carnage, had looked up at meetings and seen the light spring into Kal-El’s eyes when a new conflict was laid out in front of them. Bruce knows what it means.

____

He doesn’t move a muscle. In this moment, for the first time in his life, he has no idea whether Lord Superman would really try and kill him. All he knows now is to never dismiss Kal-El’s instincts.

____

“Bruce,” Kal-El mutters, breaking the silence as he shakes his head. His hand stretches out again, smiling encouragingly, as though he really imagined Bruce would reach out and take it.

____

There’s a split second when Kal-El’s face hardens, smile sliding from his face like oil, that Bruce thumbs the pouch at his belt as adrenaline floods his system. For a split second, he sees how this might end and it terrifies him. His body jerks again, but this time he redirects the nervous energy to lifting his cowl and bearing his face, mind racing too quick to think straight as a thousand different situations flicker behind his eyes.

____

Last night he’d made a plan of attack for their conversation, convinced himself that Lord Superman was reasonable and willing to listen, that after all they’d been through together, he’d surely listen to him. This morning, he tracked down Diana in the Watchtower, wanting her at his back if he needed… just in case. There’s been a woman with her eyes and gentle smile, but her long hair and costume had been traded in for something harder, leaner. The words died in his throat as she met his eyes with resigned sadness, her hand gently cupping his cheek before she left without a word. He’d fled to the safety of the cave, the solitude a comfort when out there, for the first time in years, he’d never felt more alone.

____

Here and now, there was an idea half formed in the back of his mind. Bruce had seen the looks, felt the hugs that lingered on his skin for hours afterwards, and wondered. He had the kryptonite if need be. Lord Superman was quick, but even now ruling from on high, he was still too headstrong to imagine any resistance. His unwavering belief was always a blessed weakness. And Bruce had always wondered what it would be like, if he made that first move.

____

Bruce slips the cowl fully from his head and takes a quick breath before tilting his head just so. It curves his neck and brings the vulnerable line of his jaw in sharp relief. Catwoman had told him once just how unbearably alluring it was when he looked at her like that. He hadn’t meant it like that then, and now, he’s not entirely sure what it means. Except when he glances through lowered lashes at Lord Superman, the dangerous hardness in his eyes has disappeared.

____

Something else has taken its place, a hungry thing Bruce isn’t entirely sure he can control.

____

He wets his lips and rests his hands on the hard jut of his hips. Just above the pouch of kryptonite.

____

Kal-El is watching him now, hands still raised in supplication. Waiting for Bruce to offer. The thought makes his gut lurch. The dangerous glint returns when Bruce doesn’t move to take that offer.

____

_Don’t stop now_ , he hisses to himself.

____

It’s easier to turn his back instead, unclasping the cape from his shoulders. The movements are mechanical, a routine Bruce has practically done in his sleep a thousand times. The Kevlar armour comes next, falling to the ground with a heavy clank before he moves to the hidden buckle at his wrists. A hand on his waist stills him. Bruce glances over his shoulder, meeting Kal-El’s eyes that crinkle with a familiar smile.

____

“Allow me,” he says, ever the gracious gentlemen.

____

The utility belt is ripped from Bruce’s waist like paper, jerking his hips forward.

____

Bruce spins, outraged, and stills. Kal-El weighs the belt in his hand, frown slipping over his face. A thousand horrific possibilities spiral out of control in Bruce’s mind, and he jerks forward, slamming his mouth against the hard line of Kal-El’s lips.

____

Once, long ago, Bruce had allowed himself to imagine this moment. Prowling the streets of Gotham, standing shoulder to shoulder with the League, waiting for an enemy strike, he had imagined what it might feel like to have Superman’s kisses. Would they be soft and gentle, the sweet slow kisses of a new lover? Or perhaps they’d be hard, desperate, frantic for one another, a stolen moment of passion after a battle? Once, he’d imagined Clark Kent coming to him for an interview, eyes confused behind those oversized glasses as Bruce wound a hand around his tie and dragged him close to lick at the seam of Clark’s lips. Once, after an attack by Brainiac, there’d been a moment where Superman had looked at him with such relief in his eyes that Bruce had imagined not even bothering to remove the cowl, uncaring of the scrape of armour against his face as he cupped his hands around the cut of Superman’s jaw and devoured his mouth.

____

He’d never imagined it like this. Kal-El’s mouth is hard under his lips, a hand resting lightly on his waist. It felt like kissing marble, a cold statue unmoving beneath Bruce’s touch. His heart shutters with a spark of terror. With a soft hum, Kal-El’s mouth parts slowly against Bruce’s lips, but the kiss is strangely cold, his mouth moving mechanically. Something terrible lodges in Bruce’s heart and he pulls back, meaning to step away and play the whole thing off before retreating to the Bat Cave for the next decade. Before he can move, the hand on his waist tightens.

____

Kal-El tilts his head slightly, wooden smile on his face once more. “What’s the matter, Bruce?”

____

For a horrible moment, Bruce lets himself hope that Superman has been brainwashed, controlled, and replaced by a robot replica. The real Superman was locked away somewhere in need of rescue, horrified at what the false Lord Superman had done. It’s almost sickening, how much Bruce wants that to be the case.

____

His tongue feels leaden in his mouth. “I thought- There were times you had looked at me like… Sorry, I must have been mistaken.”

____

Lord Superman’s eyes glitter crimson for a split second. “I looked like I wanted you to kiss me?” His voice is smooth as molasses.

____

Unwillingly, Bruce feels his heartrate tick up. He covers it with a small shrug. He wishes he’d left the cowl on.

____

“Once or twice.” Bruce frowns at the petulant tone in his own voice. He sounds like Dick when he was younger, playfully whining when he didn’t get his way. He’s only doing this because it was necessary to keep things in check before they spiralled further out of control, so why should he care if Lord Superman didn’t want him?

____

“And if I did, why did you think you should kiss me?” Kal-El’s voice is still light, impossible to read. “Pity, perhaps? You always were so kind, Bruce.”

____

Bruce’s frown deepens, genuine anger curling in his gut now. He pulls away, ignoring the warning flex of those fingers on his hips as he stumbles back. “You think I’m so loose I’d try and seduce you to make you _feel_ better?” he snarls, pleased when Kal-El’s eyes widen with surprise. “Sorry, Lord Superman, but bleeding hearts only go so far. I’m not about to spread my legs because you’re some charity case.”

____

Kal-El’s eyebrows twitch. His smile widens, tight with some emotion Bruce can’t quite parse. It makes his belly clench with want even as his instincts scream _‘run’_.

____

“Is that what you’re offering me, Bruce?” Kal-El’s asks softly. He runs a hand down Bruce’s arm, curling his fingers to cup his elbow. “Are you going to spread your legs for me?”

____

The Joker’s face swims behind his eyes, vacant smile and dreamy voice greeting him through the bars of Arkham as though he and Batman were old friends simply catching up. Bruce wonders what he’ll find when he next visits Arkham. How many more will have had their minds stripped away on the whim of Lord Superman? He thinks of Diana’s short hair and the seat the Lords respectfully leave vacant during meetings, the placid smile on the Joker’s face and the stench of smoking flesh slumped over the President’s desk.

____

“Later,” he says, like a coward. “We need to get to the meeting room for Lady Hawkgirl’s report.”

____

A hand like steel closes around his wrist. Lord Superman’s plastic smile is firmly in place. “We’ll make it quick then.”

____

Sweat breaks out on Bruce’s upper lip. It wasn’t a suggestion.

____

“Later,” he repeats, desperately, but Superman is pushing him back by the wrist onto the wide bed.

____

“Relax, Bruce,” Kal-El murmurs, hands on his shoulders pushing him inexorably down. “Let me take care of you.”

____

_Let me own you,_ Bruce corrects in his head. He scowls, relenting, aware that in the darkened corner of the wall lies his belt, the locked pouch his only chance at retaliation if he needs it. He prays he doesn’t need it.

____

Kal-El’s hands trace the edges of the undersuit, feathering over Bruce’s sides. They slide around the sharp cut of his hip bones, following the line down to his crotch. There’s the barest sensation of pressure through the reinforced fabric of the undersuit and he can’t help twitching his hips. At once, Kal-El’s gaze sharpens, a watchful, calculating look settling over his marble face as he slides his fingers lower. Bruce doesn’t move his head even as those fingers slide out of sight, forcing his face to remain its usual blankness. Kal-El tilts his head, curl falling over his left eye as there’s a steady press of a thumb against the delicate space of his perineum. The marble face cracks, Kal-El’s mouth ticking up into a smile when Bruce’ bites back a moan at the featherlight sensation. He feels his cock harden in his undersuit despite the restricted pressure of the material. In retaliation, he lifts his hips, wriggling against the sheets just to feel the slight tug of his suit against his flesh, filling his cock even more at the faint stimulation.

____

_More_ , he doesn’t say, _touch me more_.

____

But he forgets himself. He forgets who Lord Superman is now. The touch against his perineum slips for the briefest second to graze lower, right above where his hole is twitching with want before those hands slip away from his hips entirely. Biting back a grunt, Bruce tries to will his muscles to relax as a desperate tingling curls through his inner thighs, shivering up to his groin as his cock hardens against the undersuit, almost painful now.

____

The single curl brushes against Bruce’s belly as Kal-El dips his head and rubs his nose against the soft divot of Bruce’s bellybutton, hands resuming their exploration over Bruce’s suit, touch too delicate for him to really feel it. The tingling spreads wherever Kal-El strokes him, the faint pressure enough to awaken his sensitive skin before those hands move on to a new area to map. It’s just enough but not quite right that Bruce’s upper lip is already beginning to sweat, fighting the urge to squirm. He’s not used to this restrained kind of sex, not since Selina had disappeared from his life with a sad smile and the keys to his Lamborghini. He wants to move, but he also doesn’t want to give the game away, can’t bear the thought of being caught wanting. But he does. He wants those hands on his skin. He wants Lord Superman’s hands. He suppresses a shiver as those same hands that he’d seen snap necks and punch through flesh delicately stroke over his hips, press against his thighs and circle around his ankles. Bruce feels like he’s being learnt. Memorised.

____

There’s that hungry light in Kal-El’s eyes again.

____

Warm fingers slide over the bump of his knee bone, tracing over the bunched muscles of his calf. Kal-El shifts back onto his knees, lifting Bruce’s foot into his lap. In the quiet of the room, snap of the clasps opening sounds like gunfire. Bruce swallows, forcing himself to focus before the old urge to disassociate takes hold. He was still safe here even without his suit, the little green stone hidden away in his belt a safety net should the need arise. But he doesn’t need that with Lord Superman, the hero who had finally brought true peace to the world. _Keep it together_ , he warns himself before he can start unravelling, _no loosing focus during the opportunity of a lifetime._ Popping his neck brings the physical back into sharp relief, his mind retreating as his body lit up like a Christmas tree, arousal making him overly sensitive to each touch.

____

The room is pleasantly warm, but Bruce still shivers as his boots are pulled from his feet, the tickling sensation of fingers briefly pressing into the arch of his foot. Kal-El places them to the side, fussing over them till they stood neatly. Bruce watches him, eyes half-lidded as a curl of desire warms his skin. There’s something detached in the way Kal-El is moving, his movements slow and measured and utterly mechanical. Dangerous. And mildly insulting. Bruce had always half-hoped for this exact opportunity in the dark corners of his heart, but he wasn’t used to disinterest from his partners.

____

He presses the pad of his foot down, feels the bulge beneath his toes twitch. He curls his toes, smirking when Kal-El shoots him an irritated look.

____

“Stalling, Lord Superman?” he drawls, toes pressing into the frankly impressive length hardening beneath his touch.

____

“Bruce,” Kal-El warns, hands clenching at his sides.

____

Smiling, Bruce drags his foot up, toe catching at the ‘S’ emblazoned on his chest. Could it be that Lord Superman was hesitating? As much as the idea irks him, Bruce can’t help the bloom of fondness at what a picture that paints, Clark afraid to touch from some romantic notion of love and gentleness in his mind of them. The sweetness of a first time. He’s sure Clark was raised on that ideal and conjured some fairy tale first time in his head. But Clark is dead, and Lord Superman had stopped ideas of kindness and sweetness long ago in lieu of victory and an endless, inescapable peace. Happily, ever after. But Bruce had grown out of fairy tales long ago, and he wanted something a bit more _lasting_.

____

“Something wrong, Clark?” he replies, voice rough with the well-perfected Bruce Wayne brand of flirtatious yet flippant.

____

The old name feels stale on his tongue, but it does the trick. Kal-El’s eyes spark with red and he snarls, hands slamming down on Bruce’s hips like two cement blocks. He grunts, pain blossoming across his skin as Kal-El’s hands drag over his crotch, squeezing roughly at his cock through the fabric. It’s far too tight, the pleasure twisting into pain. Bruce cries out all the same as Kal-El leans down and flattens his tongue against the suit, right over his still-hard cock. There’s a bite of teeth that sends a jolt right through his thighs, his hips lifting on their own as he chases the sensation.

____

“More, more,” he gasps, the vague ideas of pretending leaving his head as Kal-El smiles Clark’s smile, the one that is warm and gentle and so beautifully full of hope, before he opens his mouth and _sucks_.

____

Bruce groans, tangling his fingers in dark curls. Kal-El pauses, lifting his mouth with a tut. There’s a line of saliva that follows his lips from the suit, the inky grey fabric of the undersuit glistening where his mouth had been.

____

“Hands on the bed, Bruce.” A command. Bruce frowns and pulls hard at Kal-El’s curls. He doesn’t budge. “Now.” There’s real steel in his voice now, a stark contrast to the smile on his face.

____

Bruce pauses, weighing the situation. It wasn’t the farm boy smile of Clark Kent, nor was it the reassuring smile of Lord Superman. It wasn’t even the new plastic smile he’d adopted as he assured the world that all the Lords’ actions were for humanity’s own good. This was a new smile, a dangerously sharp one full of promise. He’d seen it once before, a body unrecognizable on the table and the stench of burnt flesh filling the room. The day Clark Kent died and Kal-El took his place. A smile of unwavering purpose. A smile of a killer.

____

The smile he’d chosen to believe in, even now.

____

He shouldn’t give in. Bruce knows that, knows if he relents now then any hope for Clark is gone for good. But he wants to believe in the future Lord Superman promises, one where no boy will lose his parents in an alley every again. No more tragedy, no more loss.

____

Swallowing, he nods, loosening his hands from soft curls.

____

“Very good,” Kal-El praises him.

____

In retaliation, Bruce raises his arms above his head instead of onto the bed, crossing his wrists as though he was cuffed. Lord Superman chokes on his tongue.

____

He bares his teeth in a wolfish smile as Kal-El sputters, tugging a pillow under his head and settling back into the crimson sheets. He wonders if he should take off his gloves, wrap his mouth around his fingers and pull them off with his teeth. What would the farm boy think then? If Kal-El wanted to hold him down, then Bruce would be more then happy to show him exactly what sin looked like, a lifetime of beautiful women and men hanging off his arms at charity events teaching him every debauchery imaginable. Bruce wasn’t going to be some ingenue swooning at the hard steel of Lord Superman’s hands, and if they were going to play this game, Bruce was going to win.

____

“Good enough for you?” he purrs, watching Kal-El’s eyes go dark despite the flush still staining his cheeks.

____

In retaliation, Kal-El shifts down the edge of the bed, leaning his chest against the mattress to free his arms. Holding Bruce’s gaze, he reaches around to slide his palms up the outside of Bruce’s thighs, dragging his fingers against the undersuit until Bruce bites his lip against a whimper.

____

“That’ll work perfectly, thank you,” Kal-El responds in that overly polite manner as though he wasn’t just sucking Bruce’s cock through his clothes.

____

Resting his head against the bracket of Bruce’s thigh, Kal-El lazily traces around the curve of Bruce’s ass, rubbing his knuckle against Bruce’s perineum until he’s squirming, hips tilting under the heavy weight of Kal-El’s body. “Just a second,” Kal-El mutters, eyebrows dipping with concentration as he presses his nail to the underside of Bruce’s balls.

____

“Wha-” Bruce begins to say before there’s a loud rip and the undersuit splits apart underneath Kal-El’s fingernail.

____

“Are you _kidding_ me?” Bruce snarls, scrambling to sit as his suit gapes open at the crotch. “Do you know how much time it takes to re-”

____

Kal-El flattens his tongue against the underside of Bruce’s cock and licks. Everything else whites out as the heat of that tongue melts against Bruce’s skin. He collapses back onto the pillows, biting back a desperate moan as Kal-El sucks at the seam where his balls snug under his cock.

____

“Don’t fuss, Bruce. It was necessary,” Kal-El says gently, teeth scraping against the delicate skin of Bruce’s balls. The same tired old excuse he had given when he’d lobotomised the Joker, when he’d set up the global curfew, the same thing he’d said standing over the smouldering ash that had once been President Luthor. “Now let me touch you.” There’s a snap of a lube bottle, and then those warm fingers return, sliding along the thick vein on the underside of Bruce’s cock and pressing a nail into the spongey head.

____

Bruce stuffs his fingers into his mouth to stifle his desperate gasps, thighs trembling with the effort of holding still. He wants to move so badly, rock into Kal-El’s hot mouth and feel that tongue on his cock until he comes. He wants to forget what Kal-El has just said and ignore that he’s only ripped the undersuit enough to make use of him, keeping the rest of Bruce covered. Perhaps that was why the room was still dark as Bruce writhed on silken sheets, easier to pretend for Kal-El when he didn’t have to see. His heart clenches painfully tight at the thought.

____

Kal-El draws back with a frown, fingers tightening on Bruce’s hips. “I heard that. What did you think about just now?”

____

Bruce presses his mouth shut, breathing hard through his nose. Kal-El’s eyes flash a warning red.

____

“Do I have to ask your body, then?” Kal-El hisses, and at once Bruce tenses as a slick finger presses against his rim.

____

“Don’t-” Bruce starts, unsure what he even means to say, but then Kal-El’s finger is sliding in, stretching him open as pleasure ignites over his body at the rough slide.

____

“Don’t what, Bruce?” Kal-El snaps, pulling his elbow down to slide another finger in.

____

Bruce’s back bows upwards, bare toes scrabbling for purchase against Kal-El’s back.

____

“Don’t stop? Because it surely wouldn’t be anything else, now would it?” Kal-El presses his mouth to the leaking tip of Bruce’s cock, flattening his tongue against the slit until Bruce’s gasps around his own hands. There’s a scrap of teeth that sends a jolt of fear through him despite the waves of pleasure, the stray idea of those teeth closing in a brief moment of anger, no different from the second it took to end Luthor. “You started this, Bruce, because you wanted me, not because of pity or anger but because you trust me, you chose me.” Each word is punctuated by a sharp thrust of his fingers, hard enough that Bruce is already aching with that familiar pleasurable burn.

____

Kal-El draws his head back from Bruce’s trembling cock, lips shining with spit and pre-cum. Inside Bruce, he can feel fingers curl until they bump against that little ridge of nerves that sends liquid heat through his veins. Moaning, he reaches for Kal-El before he can think better of it. At the touch of his sweaty fingers against his face, trying in vain to tug him closer, Kal-El’s body relaxes back into the bracket of Bruce’s thighs.

____

“You love me, don’t you, Bruce?” he asks, but the way Kal-El says it makes the base of Bruce’s skull prickle with unease. It sounded so… matter of fact. “That’s why you understand why I had to take those measures.” His fingers stroke over the ridge of nerves as he speaks, Bruce gives up trying to move Kal-El’s mouth over him and instead desperately fists the sheets, hips knocking against the immovable force of Kal-El’s body. He grinds down on Kal-El’s thick fingers with a keening whine, a blurt of pre-cum splashing over his belly.

____

With a sharp smile, Kal-El leans back and withdraws his fingers until they rest at Bruce’s tight rim. “Don’t you, Bruce?” His fingers scissor, pulling Bruce’s rim open. He spits, and despite himself, Bruce’s face burns at the slick feeling of hi saliva landing in his open hole. At his silence, that sharp smile turns brittle, uncertainty in those blue eyes as they search Bruce’s face.

____

“Don’t you?” he repeats, voice hushed.

____

Even after everything, Bruce still breaks apart at the sight. “Yes,” he whispers back.

____

Kal-El blinks, and suddenly it’s Clark that is there, rubbing his eyes with sticky fingers, smile brittle.

____

“Yes, yes of course you do. I was being stupid, thinking that you would try and-” Clark huffs a laugh, chuckling harder when Bruce gasps at the sensation vibrating against his groin. “I’ve been waiting for you to say it before I did anything, but the way you _looked_ tonight. Bruce, you really are too much sometimes.”

____

Clark, Kal-El, whatever his Lord Superman calls himself now, it doesn’t matter. He had been trying so hard, and Bruce had seen that. The kryptonite was a failsafe he hoped to never use, watching his friend every step of the way as the new regime formed around them, but he’d sat back and done nothing, hadn’t he? In the end, he had made his choice long ago. So long as Lord Superman could still smile like that at him, he would continue to stand by his choice.

____

Kal-El slides up Bruce’s body, his black suit dragging against Bruce’s wet cock. Nudging his nose under Bruce’s chin, Kal-El brushes a soft kiss to the underside of his jaw as he slips his fingers back into Bruce’s puffy rim. Bruce’s whole body spasms, heels driving into Kal-El’s back as he arches up against the hard barrel chest, frantically rocking onto those thick fingers.

____

“You’re so good for me, aren’t you, Bruce,” Kal-El says tightly, eyes gleaming strangely bright in the dark of the room. His thumb jabs down hard into the delicate skin at the base of Bruce’s cock as his fingers grinds up against his prostate. Bruce howls, orgasm ripping through him as Kal-El presses the heel of his other hand down over the spongy head of Bruce’s cock, dragging down until his fingers catch on the slit. The stimulation all at once is too much for Bruce, pleasure crashing through him as he rocked himself down hard against the fingers inside him. His scrabbling fingers catch on Kal-El’s curls, the dark now threaded with streaks of white.

____

Leaning down, Kal-El kisses him softly as he gasps through the aftershocks, body twitching in confused pleasure and pain as Kal-El’s fingers rub his oversensitive rim slowly.

____

“Stop,” Bruce mutters, trying to pull away his still twitching hips as the sensations begins to verge on pain from the overstimulation. Kal-El kisses him again, eyes fixed on his fingers playing with the wet tip of Bruce’s cock.

____

“You’re beautiful, Bruce,” Kal-El says wonderingly. “So strong and beautiful and kind to everyone – it’s why everyone loves you. It’s why I love you.”

____

Bruce stills, faint alarm at the way Kal-El’s eyes spark a quick ruby red in the gloom.

____

“I really should lock you away,” he whispers.

____

Bruce stares, fingers still threaded in the salt and pepper of Kal-El’s hair. “But you wouldn’t do that to me,” he says, firm. Reaching down, he pushes Kal-El’s hand from his oversensitive cock, mouth a flat line of warning. His belt was still in the corner as a failsafe. There’s a dangerous woodenness now to Kal-El’s face, hands limp as he hovers over Bruce. For a second, he looks terribly, hopelessly lost.

____

Taking a chance, Bruce leans up and presses his lips against Kal-El’s. The answering kiss is frighteningly cold, but when he pulls back, it’s Clark’s crinkled smile he sees, the warm Superman of the years before the Lords became dictators shining through as he cups Bruce’s chin as nibbles a kiss into his jaw.

____

“No,” Kal-El murmurs, ducking his head sheepishly to rest against Bruce’s sternum. His sticky fingers trace a pattern along Bruce’s throat. “No, I’d never lock you away like that. Because you love me, don’t you, Bruce?”

____

“Of course I do,” Bruce replies, because he does, he made his choice long ago, he made it now, and he’ll stay by Lord Superman’s side, even if the machine in the Bat Cave was ready for testing tomorrow, ready to rip open a new world for them to conquer. Even if the fingers around his throat feel like a collar. 

____


End file.
